Time machine

allfreechips · #1 06-26-2007, 10:05 AM

So, what would you do differently when you started if you had the ability to send yourself a letter into the past?

Obvious ones I think of

-Start Early, like 1990
-Pick a much better domain name to start with that has some SEO value
-Tell the professor there's no future in online gaming and take his job

Professor · #2 06-26-2007, 10:12 AM

-Start Early, like 1990 (Too early, very little internet access for 99% of people, ultra slow dial up modems. Primitive graphics etc... Beam me back to 1998 again!)

-Pick a much better domain name to start with that has some SEO value
(we all could have been millionaires many times over had we done this and just picked up domains like slots.com, poker.com, gambling.com etc...)

-Tell the professor there's no future in online gaming and take his job (Are we going into the past now or the future?

)

allfreechips · #3 06-26-2007, 10:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Professor

-Start Early, like 1990 (Too early, very little internet access for 99% of people, ultra slow dial up modems. Primitive graphics etc... Beam me back to 1998 again!)

-Pick a much better domain name to start with that has some SEO value
(we all could have been millionaires many times over had we done this and just picked up domains like slots.com, poker.com, gambling.com etc...)

-Tell the professor there's no future in online gaming and take his job (Are we going into the past now or the future?

)

Lets hope for all our sakes were talking in the past

AmCan · #4 06-27-2007, 07:14 PM

i launched my first site in sept 1998, entered gaming in 2001.

I would go back to 1998, buy every targeted ad that i could on my creditcards and send all the traffic direct to the casinos/poker rooms. no websites. Just email and maybe an ad server. Had i done that, i'm confident i could have earned at least $15-20 million from online advertising 1998-2004, plus revshare until last fall.

It's so much easier to make a good plan if you know the outcome in advance

please PM when the machine is ready.

john1124 · #5 06-27-2007, 07:24 PM

I would go back to 1995 and buy Broadcast.com

Forget the Mav's I would try to push Davis off the Raiders.

elgoog · #6 06-27-2007, 07:26 PM

rofl

Dominique · #7 06-27-2007, 08:09 PM

I'd have to ask my husband for the exact years, but we were online in the 80s when there was no internet really. We had a Radio Shack computer with a 1200 baud modem and had a pet care site online The Pet Board. There was no name registration, you just called yourself whatever you wanted. One person could logon at a time, it was connected to a normal phone line.

Websites were Bulletin Boards and they were sort of like message boards. The "sysop" could login when a visitor was online and chat with them.

The site was busy 24 hrs amazingly, people waited forever to get on, usually you got a busy signal. Visitors had to pay huge long distance phone rates.

Some kind of ferret community started to communicate there and they left a number of messages that rivals CAP. They would sign on, type two sentences and sign off, then came the next one. All about ferrets. 24 hours a day. We just watched in wonderment.

Then we had a guy sign on and leave messages about animal torture, upsetting everyone. So we called the police and they didn't know what on earth we were talking about. They came out to the house to figure it out and ended up putting a trap on the phone and caught the guy but there was nothing to charge him with. They had to let him go but he never called again so all was good.

Then we wanted to get listed in the phonebook. They had no idea what we were talking about either. They came out to the house too to have a look. We wanted a new listing, Electronic Bulletin Boards. They kept saying: But we already have bulletin boards. (meaning the cork board you stick messages on). We did convince them to list us properly in the end.

Then we moved and I got into other things and I didn't get back online for years.

What would I do differently?

Nothing. Not a thing.

Getting started earlier would have been beneficial, but I was busy with other stuff I wouldn't want to miss.

john1124 · #8 06-27-2007, 08:18 PM

Wow, memory lane. When I was in High School back in late 80's early 90's I had a TI/994A BBS called Ti-World. Which ran off a Hayes auto-answer modem 1200/2400 baud. You would have to keep a seperate phone line for people to call and it only took one connection at a time. Those were the good ole days!

elgoog · #9 06-27-2007, 08:26 PM

Thank you Dom for your usefull posts....

I wished my dad would still be aroiund, and would be able to see how things evolved...

(I als like the dots.....points.....thx to BB1.....)

B4 internet existed he posted taperecording tapes..... you know....on the regular mail to friends around the world...
His big hobby, for his completelive life was genealogy, he travelled a lot to read all those old books,....
wich are alll online now....
he downloaded my first computer games from the bulletinboards Dom talked about, must have been like 1985,i'll ask my mom...
he would have enjoyed the internet sooo much.....

What i would have done better in the past?
Well,i could him have had on dial up for sure during his life

Professor · #10 06-27-2007, 08:29 PM

I was online back then also, but there really wasnt any internet and BBS were even a novelty at the time. My first PC was a Timex Sinclair (cassette tape memory), then I moved on to a TI 994A (Remember Bill Cosby pushing these), I also had a TRS80 from Radio Shack and a Commodore Vic20.

All of those machines were so primitive I cant imagine setting up a commercial website with those dinosaurs. I think the first real websites I built were around 1996/1997 and I had a crappy dial up modem US Robotics Speedster 14.4!

Actually in terms of computing those days actually sucked! Give me todays PCs, software and broadband!

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The Following User Says Thank You to allfreechips For This Useful Post:
elgoog (06-27-2007)

The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to Dominique For This Useful Post:
Astronaut (06-28-2007), elgoog (06-27-2007), Engineer (06-27-2007), NatalieStewart (06-28-2007)